Developed By: FuRyu
Published By: NIS America
Categories: RPG
Release Date: 03.22.24
Price: $49.99

I’ve been telling everyone for the last few months that I thought FuRyu has been quickly growing into one of the best developers on the Switch. They developed or worked on many great games over the last few years such as Trinity Trigger, Crymachina, and The Alliance Alive, among many others. That’s an impressive track record and it’s what made me want to play The Legend of Legacy HD Remastered despite never having played the original on the 3DS. I also tend to love games that are published by NIS America and the trailer looked very promising.

When I first started playing, I thought the opening hours or so was pretty slow because there was a lot of exposition and it took some time to unlock saves and most menus. But after I got through the first hour or two, the gameplay loop and different mechanics became lots of fun. The two gameplay options that I liked the most were the mapping system and the choice of weapons. In most RPG’s, you equip a weapon and that’s it. But in this game, you can equip multiple weapons at once and switch between them on a turn by turn basis. This is a pretty unique method and it was great for developing the perfect party.

On the other hand, mapping is an exploration aspect that added so much to the game. Every area of the game gets a blank map and as you explore, the map gets filled in. Once you’re done exploring, you can sell the map in Initium. You can sell a map whenever you want but you’ll earn more money if the map is fully filled in. Buying maps is also how you unlock new areas to explore. I absolutely love this mechanism because it’s a great way to earn more money and it gives you a reason to explore every inch of an area.

As for what the game is about, that’s a bit tough to answer because while the overall story is the same, the character you choose will alter some elements. The game takes place on Avalon, a Continent that was discovered only ten years before the start of the game and there are seven unique characters to play as. Each of them have their own reason for traveling to Avalon and they each have their own unique ending, dialogue, and starting party. Personally I went with Owen because I tend to love mercenaries in media. While I did like his story elements, I did care for the overall story more. 

It’s because of this that I didn’t see much of a reason to start a new game once you complete your first playthrough. You might want to see the story stuff of the other characters but this isn’t like Fire Emblem Three Houses where each path is basically a different game. It’s mostly the same game each time with only the introduction, ending, and party members being slightly different. However, you’ll still be plenty satisfied with just doing a single playthrough because it’s a fully fledged RPG story and experience that could cost you at least 30 hours. If you focus on completing each map and doing all the little things, you could easily push 60 hours with one character.

When it comes to graphics, this was an area that I really enjoyed. The environments look great for a game that was originally on the 3DS and blown up to fit a bigger screen. I especially loved the hand drawn aesthetics of Initium and the amount of detail present when viewing on an OLED Switch or a big TV screen is impressive. I also liked how each of the maps looked. My only complaint is how objects and scenery popped in as you run through an area. This isn’t an issue on its own but enemies follow the same behavior. The game allows you to avoid enemies you don’t want to fight but they will pop in right on top of you as you run, triggering a battle immediately. This wouldn’t be an issue if you could see more of the map at once, but overall the game looks great.

As for sound, I didn’t care too much and thought it might have been the weakest aspect of the game. This was mostly because of the lack of voice acting since the only character in the game that has speaking lines is the narrator. That isn’t a dealbreaker but it left me wanting more. As for the rest of sound, I really enjoyed the music.

Until this point, I mentioned a bunch of things that make the game great, but many of them were aspects that were already present in the original 3DS game. Are there any significant changes or upgrades between the 3DS and Switch versions? The short answer is not really. The main change is that the UI has been completely overhauled. The 3DS version made heavy use of the bottom screen but FuRyu seamlessly integrated all the content from the bottom screen with into the main game to make one coherent spectacle.

Another upgrade is simply the visuals. I’ve seen what the game looks like on the 3DS and blowing that up to fit the bigger Switch screen or a TV probably wouldn’t look that good without some tweaking. Fortunately FuRyu did a great job with making sure that the game looked as good as it could on the Switch. There are also a handful of other minor quality of life changes here and there that really make the remaster stand out.

So is The Legend of Legacy HD Remastered worth picking up? The answer is a resounding yes, especially if you haven’t played the original. I think it’s one of the best remasters that you can play on the Switch and a great RPG overall.

4.5/5